


It's just a sunshine song and it won't take long.

by cptandor



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, F/M, Lawyer Ben Solo
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-25
Updated: 2020-04-25
Packaged: 2021-03-02 03:47:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,628
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23844706
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cptandor/pseuds/cptandor
Summary: When he first met Rey Niima, he didn’t see her face.orSix times Ben meets Rey.
Relationships: Kylo Ren/Rey, Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
Comments: 8
Kudos: 70
Collections: 9 Squares Reylo Challenge





	It's just a sunshine song and it won't take long.

**Author's Note:**

> Many thanks to [@allhdvm](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Allhdvm) for the help with this ficlet! All mistakes are my own! Part of the 9squares Reylo challenge. Prompt: Yellow.

_ When he first met Rey Niima _ , he didn’t see her face. It was the week of Mother’s Day and the flower shop was packed - last minute orders being put in, just as he was hoping to do. A large collection of bright sunflowers walked past him and he stopped her to ask where he should be to put in his order. A hand reached out from behind the large, tall flowers, and pointed to a long line, and she hurriedly replied, “That line there,” in a slight accent. Ben nodded, and then realizing the employee probably couldn’t see him, muttered a “thank you” and headed in the direction she had indicated.

_ The second time he meets Rey Niima _ , he doesn’t realize she is the florist who saved his butt just days before Mother’s Day. This time, she’s walking a dog in a park and a tennis ball flies very near to his face. He is sitting on a bench reading the paper and the young woman wearing a pretty yellow sundress is suddenly in his face with apologies and explanations and her dog - whose name appears to be Abby - is climbing over him on the bench with all of her 70 lbs to get to the ball, which is just behind his bench now. He can’t get two words in to tell her not to worry about it, but as soon as her apologies are finished, she’s putting the dog back on her leash and then she’s off again, her dog mouthing happily on the now retrieved tennis ball and running off in a flash.

_ The third time he meets Rey Niima _ , he finally gets her name, and it’s with a bright, “Park Guy!” from her. He has stopped into the flower shop again, this time for his mother’s birthday in late June, and there she is, seemingly knowing who he is without him knowing who she is. “Park Guy?” he asks, somewhat grumpily, not having any clue what she’s talking about. “The guy from the park! Abby nearly ran you over,” she says, extending her hand over the counter, “I’m Rey, it’s nice to meet you, officially,” her smile is bright and her introduction genuine, like she’s actually glad to meet him. “Abby’s my dog,” she further explains. He knew that and says so.

“Anyway,” he says, cutting off her happy small talk, “I need to order a bouquet for June 20th. My mother’s birthday, so, you know, put something together for a mother’s birthday.”

She cocks her head, reminding him of the doofy golden retriever he’d met the week before. “You don’t want to pick anything out for it? Surely you want her favorite flowers or something,” her sunny disposition seems to have dulled just a bit in the face of his sullenness.

“I don’t know her favorite flowers,” he says, giving her a confused, annoyed look. Who knows their mother’s favorite flower? “Just, make it nice.” He adds, feeling that should be enough instruction - they’re the florists, after all, he is the furthest thing from one.

“Okay...” she says, ringing him up for a standard bouquet price and no longer trying anymore to pull him out of his shell.

_ The fourth time he sees Rey _ , it’s under decidedly poor circumstances. It’s late July when he looks up from his desk, his 2 o’clock appointment having arrived to read her grandfather’s will. And there she is, in a different yellow sundress, despite the dreary weather outside and the weighty reason for her visit to his firm. How is it he remembers so clearly what she was wearing in the park? “Miss...” She looks up - he’s so very tall - at him and a small, sad smile lights up her face for just a second, as if she remembers his demeanor in the flower shop, or why she is here in the first place. “Niima,” she supplies. “Yes, of course, I knew that,” he says, shuffling the papers in front of him on his desk.

“Miss Niima, I’m sorry for your loss,” he tries again.

“Thank you, Mr. Solo.”

“How do you know my...? Oh, right, they would have told you who you had an appointment with, wouldn’t they.” He says, but it’s not a question, and she doesn’t reply.

He reads the will with all the personality of a robot, doing his best not to look at her pretty face or the way her dress hugs her in just the right places, somehow without being inappropriate, even for such an occasion. When he finishes and he’s walking her to the door she can’t help herself and it just sort of bubbles up out of her when she says, “Funny, how we keep running into each other,” and something inside of him reacts to her.

“It’s a small town,” is all he says before they reach the elevator and he says, “Again, I’m sorry for your loss,” before it arrives and she disappears into it.

That’s all there was to it, he concluded to himself. Just a small town.

_ The fifth time he sees Rey _ , she doesn’t even smile at him. It’s been two weeks since they read her grandfather’s will, and she obviously recognizes him by now, but there’s not a shiny smile or bright greeting. As if she’s finally caught on to how miserable of a human being he is. Mostly he’s glad for it, but there is a small part of him that feels bad. She’s so sunshiny, what right does he have to spoil that for her?

It’s that small part of him - he’s sure - that gives her the smallest of smiles as he catches her eye and says with a quiet chuckle, “Come here often?” Granted, they are standing just a block from the flower shop she works at, and he is headed to lunch and they are stuck at a crosswalk waiting for the light to change, so the joke falls flat.

“Mr. Solo,” she says with a nod.

“Ben,” he says quickly, eagerly, “Call me Ben.” His change in attitude seems to catch her attention and looks up at him once more, “Ben,” she repeats him with a small smile.

She has a small, fake sunflower in her hair, and he indicates it with his chin before saying, “Are those your favorite flower?” He doesn’t know why he asks it, but her smile brightens considerably and she tells him that ‘yes, they are’ and then the light changes and they’re off on their own ways. Ben thinks about that all day at work. She is much like a sunflower, he thinks, face turned to the sunshine, brightening the days of everyone she runs into.

In fact, Ben thinks about that all week.

When one of the partners, Hux, comes to him seething over something he had missed during a meeting, he knows he must do something about it.

That day after work, he heads to the flower shop straight from the office, some three blocks away. And as he’s less than halfway there, the rain comes. Pouring buckets down on the streets, suddenly the sidewalks are empty and he is undeterred, holding his briefcase above his head as if it will help at all against the deluge.

He crashes into the flower shop all noise and too-long-limbs and bull-in-a-china-shop-finesse. She is deep in one of the coolers and starts, jumping and banging her head on the shelf above her. She turns, rubbing what must be a bump on her head, and looks him up and down before heading to the counter and asking what she can help him with.

Ben is soaked from head to toe and his suit gives him a drowned Wall Street rat sort of look; his hair is stringy and dripping down his shoulders and he’s sure his too-large ears are sticking out embarrassingly. “Um,” he starts. Is he really going to accost this young woman at her  _ job _ ? Where she  _ has _ to be nice to him? Surely that’s something he’s heard about from more progressive and vocal people than himself. That it’s  _ wrong _ to do that. She doesn’t force him to speak, and just waits patiently, looking at him with slight amusement on her face from across the tiny store. He tries again as he crosses the space to come to the counter across from her. “Listen, I know you’re at work and this is totally inappropriate, but we keep running into each other and apparently I can’t stop thinking about you and if I’m insane just tell me and I won’t bother you anymore, I promise, but I’d like to take you out to dinner this weekend if you’re at all interested.”

It all comes out in a quick jumble of words and breathiness. He’s somewhat aware that he looks ridiculous and probably a little bit deranged, but he’s now said it and at least he has gotten it out and can go back to being a total monster of efficiency at work. That’s really his only goal, and so what happens next throws him completely off balance.

“Oh! Um, I kind of thought you couldn’t stand me,” she says with a nervous laugh, and then, “I’d like that,” and this time  _ he _ looks like the curious golden retriever but he doesn’t care. He smiles, big and bright and it’s the first time she’s seen that. It’s beautiful.

“How’s Saturday night sound? Meet me here at say... 8 o’clock?” She adds, and he nods, still stunned that she’s said yes and he has something  _ new _ to be consumed by in the coming days.

It’s still raining outside as he ducks out of the little shop to hail a cab home. He doesn’t notice, though, because his thoughts are filled with sunshine and sunflowers and sundresses.


End file.
